216 Geological Society of London. 
this most successful investigator of © physical opties” observed 
that the subject of double refraction is still extremely intricate 
and difficult; and that this phenomenon, like electricity and 
magnetism, presents numerous facts, which in the present state 
of our knowledge are yet inexplicable. Crystallization, he thinks, 
is probably owing to a peculiar fluid of which we have yet no 
adequate knowledge: but however this may be, the facts and 
experiments which he has adduced tend to favour the undulatory 
theory of light, &c. 
A paper On the Calculus of Function, by Mr. Babbage, was 
laid before the Society ; but it was of a nature not fit for public 
reading. 
March 21. Sir E. Home, in a short paper, related some ex- 
periments tending to prove the effects of medicines on the blood, 
whether taken into the stomach or injected into the veins. He 
injected fluids into the jugular vein of dogs, and made some ex- 
periments on himself with the eau médicinale, and instanced the 
effect it had on his pulse, which is usually 80 ina minute. He 
compared the effects with those of mercury taken into the sto- 
inach; and the general result appears to be,that poisons injected 
directly into the blood kill somewhat sooner (although in a si- 
milar mode) than if taken into the stomach. 
Part of a paper by Dr. T. Thomson was read On Phosphoric 
Acid, in which the atomic theory is mtrodueed and extended, 
and some of Dr. Berzelius’s opinions controverted. 
GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF LONDON. 
Report of the Council to the General Annual Meeting, 
February 2, 1816. 
In presenting their Report for the vear 1815, the Council have 
pleasure in announcing that the Society has increased in number, 
that its finances have improved, and that the presents and me- 
moirs transmitted to it since the last anniversary have been both 
numerous and important. 
The following is a statement of the numbers of the Society 
at the last and present anniversaries. 
transterred | | 
with- [since to the |remain 'clected/ Total. 
Feb. 
1815. } drawn |dead |foreign class 1815. 
Ordinary Members| 220* 4 8 2 206 | 34 | 240 
Iionorary Members| 92 5 87 
Foreign Members 7 7 14 
Pata mewrrers As [S12 341 
* Printed in the Report of 1815 as 222, but two of the number declined 
their election. 
